


Turning Points

by dragonofdispair



Series: Roads [22]
Category: Transformers (Bay Movies), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-05-01
Updated: 2008-05-01
Packaged: 2018-02-26 18:36:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2662256
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragonofdispair/pseuds/dragonofdispair
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first battle between the Autobots and Decepticons since Scorponok's defection ends with a victory for the Autobots. Some serious soul searching results.</p>
<p>Part One: Battle and its aftermath causes Scorponok to realize something about himself</p>
<p>Part Two: In the aftermath of a skirmish with Decepticons, Ironhide struggles to adjust his view of his former enemy</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Never before had Scorponok actually been glad to see Ironhide. Not unhappy by his presence -- sure -- more than happy to torment him if he was there -- most definitely. But happy to see him because it meant the Autobot weapon specialist was here and not somewhere else -- this was a first.

Not that Scorponok had a lot of time to ponder it. Ironhide came and wedged himself into the scant cover provided by a small dip in the landscape and some rocks. He provided cover for the injured Prime and sniped at the three Decepticons overhead -- what Scorponok had been doing, but Ironhide was better suited for it.

One of the jets brought himself to a transforming landing just outside Ironhide's range and immediately collapsed into a tank form -- a triplechanger. Scorponok thought it was probably Blitzwing -- one of his former masters had served with that 'changer a long time ago -- but he couldn't be sure past the unfamiliar angles of his new alt forms. Scorponok burrowed, using his sonar to map what parts of the ground he could dig through, and left to confront the sniper-tank, leaving his master's safety-from-the-seekers with Ironhide.

He may not trust Ironhide not to hurt him without Prime there to stop him, but Ironhide's loyalty was to Prime. He could trust the black mech would do all he could to protect his master. And someone had to at least distract Blitzwing.

His sensors registered the arrival of two ground vehicles and he surfaced out of the sand just long enough to identify the newcomers. Autobots -- Ratchet and Bumblebee -- moving to engage Blitzwing. Good.

Back beneath the sand, he heard Blitzwing leave off trying to play sniper-tank with Ironhide to engage the other two Autobots.

Now that he knew them, Scorponok's seismic and vibro sensors kept track of them effortlessly. Neatly Scorponok approached under Blitzwing. Busy, the triplechanger didn't realize his danger.

Just as he was transforming from tank to primary form, Scorponok leapt from the sand and latched onto a part in the process of becoming a leg, jamming his tail into his target. Caught mid-tranforamation, the strike did a lot more damage to the heavily armored mech than little Scorponok otherwise could have.

Jet engines screaming in rage, Blitzwing smashed his fist into the drone, sending the smaller 'bot flying

He hit the desert floor hard and in that moment of recovering from the blow and righting himself, Scorponok saw a seeker start to angle in low to get a good shot at his master and Ironhide.

No. No. No. Scorponok burrowed -- he needed to get in front of the seeker. He was not going to let this happen.

In his element, under the sand, it was hard to keep targeting on the seeker. Scorponok was not designed to attack flyers. The difficulty was compounded by the overwhelming vibrations of the jet engines working as close to the ground without touching it as this seeker's were distorting the input he was getting from his vibro sensors.

Thrust. This had to be Thrust -- he was the only seeker Scorponok knew of who had been modified to hover and crawl through the air in his alt form the way this one was doing.

Didn't matter, but if this was Thrust...

Scorponok leapt. The seeker lurched in the air under the sudden added weight. He scrambled, trying to latch on to the mech. When he thought he had the best possible grip, the best angle, he struck with his tail, aiming for Thrust's VTOL engines.

Close, but a miss. Thrust started to pull up, to the sky and Scorponok pushed away, allowing gravity to take him back to his element.

From beneath the sand, he could tell that only the Autobots were on the ground. He shivered back to the surface near his master to get a look at the Decepticons in the air.

Blitzwing was gone. The two seekers were circling. Without the triplechanger's support, there were unwilling to come back into weapons' range of the Autobots. But they were also less willing to retreat and face Starscream.

Ratchet moved to begin treating Prime's injuries while Bumblebee, Ironhide and the now arrived Cliffjumper kept their stand off with the seekers. Finally the Decepticons got bored of circling and flew off, leaving the Autobots alone in the desert.

Dimly he heard the Autobots takling around him and sensed transmissions as they contacted various humans, trying to arrange for a place to finish repairs and allow Prime to recover. Ratchet yelled at them that he was trying to concentrate, Primus fraggit. Scorponok didn't care. He had optics only for his injured master.

He crept closer until he could press himself against Prime's less injured side. Ratchet paused to give him a wary look -- of all of them Ratchet had the best reason for wariness; he'd managed to see what Scorponok had always kept hidden and to this day the scorpion drone didn't know why the medic kept it secret -- but allowed his presence.

Around them there was arguing and stomping, but none of it mattered. Not until he was yanked away from his injured master by his tail.

He screeched and tried to dig into sand, then twisted up to bite the 'bot who held him. Cliffjumper did not let go. He shook his captive somewhat viciously.

"Stay away from him, Decepticon scum."

Scorponok writhed and struggled and shrieked in the orange 'bot's hold. He shouldn't have. He knew that. He should have submitted and hoped that Cliffjumper would be content to hold him captive or that his docility would earn him some help from Ratchet or Bumblebee. Instead he fought, and no one would aid.

He master was hurt. He needed --

"Put him down, Cliffjumper."

The hands he was fighting with, shrieking and struggling, stilled. "Sir, what?"

"You heard just fine, fragger. I said put the Primus fragged drone down."

Still struggling, Scorponok noticed only another lurch when Ironhide yanked Cliffjumper off balance, then grabbed the smaller mech's hands and forced them open.

"Now -- go guide the humans here."

"But --"

"Scat!"

Back on the ground, Scorponok scrambled back to press himself against his master again. As close as pysically possible, he let out a short burst of navigational sonar and it came back with a picture of Prime's injuries. He wasn't a medic and they were unlike anything he himself could inflict. He couldn't tell --

"Stop that, slagger," Ratchet growled at him, "I can fragging hear you."

Making a series of vibrating clicks, Scorponok obeyed. If the medic decided he was in the way, he wouldn't be allowed to stay. He contented himself to just listening to his master's systems hum with his vibro seensors.

So focused was he that he didn't notice when Ironhide sent Bumblebee on a patrol arc or when he ceased his own pacing. He did notice Ironhide staring at him though and hunkered down closer (if that was possible) to Prime.

The black mech stepped closer, focused on the drone. Scorponok wanted to back away, to burrow, to flee -- without his master's protection, Ironhide was terrifying -- but that would mean moving away from where he could hear Ratchet making repairs, hear his master's systems. Suddenly he regretted harassing the big mech. Maybe if he hadn't, Ironhide would -- but...

Conflicted he huddled there, optics on Ironhide, and shivered.

He didn't see Ratchet look up with a frown. Or notice the buzz of a private transmission before the medic returned to his work.

Ironhide crouched and reached out to Scorponok. He flinched. He couldn't help it. He never expected any gentle treatment from this mech.

"Ain't gonna hurt you." Gentle though is wat he was being, brushing his fingertips so lightly they barely touched Scorponok's armor. "Ya probably saved my life -- just wanted to thank you."

Then without so much as a hint of threat, he pulled away from the confused drone. "I understand you didn't do it for me, but still...thanks." And left, back to keeping watch.

No, he hadn't done it for Ironhide.

In fact, he wasn't really sure how he'd done it at all. Scorponok was not designed to attack seekers. Curled up on Prime's form, he ran the vairables through his processor -- angles, distance, speed, the slight scrambling of his sensors from the jet's engines -- that leap had been impossible. But he hadn't run the calculations at the time, just act.

It was .. very unlike him. For anyone else he would have run the calculations. For his previous masters, occasionally he had, and never worried when they were injured -- they would be repaired or not, and he had never mourned the loss, only the broken link. Never judged their lives worth more than his own.

But for Optimus Prime, who his creator had tried to program him to hate above all others, who hadn't even accepted the command link, Scorponok had attacked a seeker on the wing. Would give everything he'd managed to keep from his other masters, and he didn't understand why.

Even having been designed and programed as a servant, the concept of willingly giving more than was asked of him was foreign. And yet, now he realized that this hadn't even been the first time. They were small things, but he'd done them not out of fear of being punished or because they'd been asked of him, but because they'd make his master happy. He'd stopped transmitting the link request because it upset Prime.

He heard his master's systems move into a more stable pattern. Weak, but stable. He was gently shooed so the Autobots could move Prime onto the flat bed trailer the humans had provided. No one protested when he hopped up to ride with him.

Listening to his master's systems hum, Scorponok set his alarms to go off if they deviated from a stable patten. Driving next to the trailer, Ratchet was obviously watching them both.

  
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	2. Chapter 2

He saved your life.

Even as Ironhide contacted Captain Lennox, Agent Banacheck, Secretary Keller and every other government person who knew, and explained what had happened -- that they needed a defensible position to conduct repairs -- his thoughts came back to that.

He saved your life.

He managed to arrange for a truck and a human driver and an empty corner lot on the nearest Air Force base. Or rather, a lot which was the easiest spot large enough for them to empty on short notice.

That Decepticon saved Ironhide's life.

But a Decepticon wouldn't have saved and Autobot's life.

He watched Scorponok press himself against Optimus's form, seeking comfort. He watched when Cliffjumper took issue with the 'Con's proximity and as Scorponok fought to return to Prime's side.

Scorponok had saved Ironhide's life, but obviously hadn't done it for Ironhide.

"Put him down, Clffjumper."

Cliffjumper stalled his attempt of get a better hold on the drone in surprise. "Sir, what?" The words were incredulous.

Suddenly Ironhide was inexplicably -- inexplicable, really? The drone saved your lives -- angry at Cliffjumper -- Cliffjumper or yourself? -- for his suspicion and hostility. More than anything right now, he did not want to argue this. "You heard me just fine, fragger," he growled. He grabbed the mini-bot's arm and pulled, holding his hands to force them open. "I said put the Primus fragged drone down."

Not that Ironhide had given Cliffjumper a choice about it. Scorponok scrambled back to Optimus, pressing worriedly to his side. Ironhide shoved Cliffjumper away from them. Cliffjumper hadn't gotten here in time for the battle. He hadn't seen -- He had no right --

"Now -- go guide the humans here." Unsurprisingly the orange 'bot tried to protest. "Scat!" The fragger scat-ed.

He and Bumblebee were arranging for the yellow 'bot to patrol, running his sensors in a wide arc to check that the 'Cons had really left, when they heard Ratchet. "Stop that, fragger. I can hear you." What he was referring to, Ironhide couldn't tell, but he was addressing Scorponok, and didn't follow it up even with a threat, so he finished the plans with Bumblebee and sent him off.

Nothing more to do but wait, unless Bumblebee found something. Ironhide paced, thinking.

He's a Decepticon. He saved your life. A Decepticon wouldn't have done that. He didn't do it for you. He's a Decepticon.

Right, like a Decepticon would've saved Optimus's life any more than Ironhide's.

But he's a slagging 'Con.

Ironhide kept circling around that contradiction. They were both true -- Scorponok's a Decepticon; Scorponok had just saved Prime and Ironhide -- but they couldn't both be true. So one had to be false.

Obviously Ironhide was not a smoking pile of scrap being danced on by a crazy seeker, so Scorponok had saved him.

Ironhide had also watched friends die from Scorponok's sneak attacks -- Primus! He'd even been on the receiving end of the fragger's tail himself. He's a slagging 'Con!

Was, the memory of Will's rebuke echoed in his thoughts, was a slagging 'Con.

Was -- state of existence, past tense.

He looked at Scorponok. The drone was curled up against Optimus, taking some sort of comfort from the contact. As he watched, critter gently stroked the side of his tail against an undamaged piece of Prime's armor -- trying to give comfort?

Scorponok noticed him staring and hunched down, shivering. Afraid of him. Two months ago, that reaction had been gratifying. Now Ironhide wasn't as sure. At this exact moment he didn't want critter to be afraid of him. He stepped forward.

Ratchet looked up with a frown. "If you're going to pick a slagging fight, this is the wrong time and place. I don't have time to play referee to your usual argument." The medic transmitted over a private channel.

Ironhide answered the same way. "I ain't gonna pick a fight."

"I'll believe that when I slagging see it." Ratchet focused back on repairs.

Ironhide continued staring at Scorponok until he came to a decision.

He was as slow, gentle, and non-threatening as he knew how to be, but Scorponok still flinched under the brush along his armor panels -- like he'd seen Optimus do. The bug looked torn between fleeing from the black mech and staying with the injured Prime. "Ain't gonna hurt you," Ironhide tried being reassuring. It didn't seem to be working. "You probably saved my life -- just wanted ta thank you. I understand you didn't do it for me but still..." he pulled his hand away, "thanks."

That was all he was going to do -- this wasn't the time or the place for anything deeper. And it was all he could do -- he still didn't have a slagging clue where he and Scorponok would stand with each other if he wasn't an enemy. Growling, Ironhide watched for any hint of Decepticons on his scanners.

Of course Ratchet wasn't going to leave it well enough alone. "That was unbelievably sappy of you."

"Shut up, fragger."

The fragger in question was still calmly re-soldering wires and patching fluid lines. The answering silence didn't fool him into thinking the medic had dropped it. A single snarky comment didn't take up nearly as much attention as an argument would.

Not in the best mood, and with nothing to take it out on (not that he really wanted to be attacked by Decepticons at the moment), Ironhide paced. When Cliffjumper and the human trailer arrived, he helped load Prime onto the vehicle. When Scorponok hopped onto the trailer to ride with Prime, he restrained both Cliffjumper's and his own impulses to protest.

A few minutes later, Bumblebee joined the convoy of vehicles headed to the Air Force base they'd arranged to stay at.

  
888

  
Optimus was going to be fine. He injuries, though severe, consisted of severed wires and fluid lines and scorching. Nothing that Ratchet's welding and his own self-repair couldn't deal with. Nothing that required replacement parts. Ratchet had been ranting that the slagger was fragging lucky that he didn't need any replacement parts and that Optimus was going to stay Right Where He Was and not so much as twitch until Ratchet said he could move. Optimus bore it with the his usual fond exasperation.

Bumblebee was busy negotiating a more permanent arrangement for medical facilities -- a storage warehouse for supplies from the Ark, in addition to the open work area they'd already been assigned, at least.

Cliffjumper had been drafted into running errands for the both of them, though what errands those two had come up with to keep the orange mini-bot busy Ironhide hadn't the slightest clue.

For his own part, Ironhide had parked himself in the desert just outside the gate in the outer fence around the base. He was close enough that the edgy gate guards watched him warily. They may have known about the Autobots, some of them may have even managed to see Ratchet and Oprimus over in the sheltered lot that had been hastily cleared out then declared off limits, but they were still far from comfortable with the idea. Ironhide ignored them. He was still dealing with the events of the battle and the conclusions he'd come to afterwards.

A faint blip on his scanners jolted Ironhide out of his brooding.

The blip was caused by nothing human made, that had Cybertronian shields -- hiding its configuration -- but wasn't hiding is presence. Before the attack by the seekers, the combination of standard Decepticon shielding and not hiding would have made him assume the blip was Scorponok. Now he paid more attention.

It was underground, whatever it was, circling from beneath the base to the road outside it.

He hadn't realized before now how much he'd begun ignoring the bug's presence on his scanners. The shielding and his inability to respond to an IFF query made it impossible to truly tag him a friendly, but there had been only two Decepticons on the planet and so Ironhide had begun just verifying that the scanner blip wasn't Barricade then ignoring it.

Scorponok scuttled out of the dirt some twenty feet away from the still untransformed back mech. Then hesitated, his back legs dug back into the ground. The wary humans had jumped, gasped, aimed weapons -- which wouldn't do much to the bug, being standard issue simple projectile guns, but it would be a bad thing if they started shooting right now. One was on the radio with his commander, describing the situation and asking for instructions and the radio blared back that they needed to stand down. For his part Scorponok was ignoring the panicked knot of humans behind the black truck and focused solely on the Autobot. Ironhide thought that if he transformed to talk to the bug, the soldiers would start shooting.

Not quite sure what the drone was doing here -- critter usually didn't come anywhere near him unless Prime was nearby -- he asked, "What do you want, bug?"

The bug just made a question noise.

The noise was apparently not one that reassured the humans of the giant, evil-looking, alien scorpion's peaceful intentions and several guns cocked. Before he'd really realized he'd done so, Ironhide had rolled between the humans and the drone -- the standard guns would do even less damage to Ironhide's armor than they would to Scorponok's.

The drone reset all four optics, the bottom pair then the top pair, and made the question noise again. Ironhide huffed.

"Ain't gonna let them shoot you for asking me a question. No one's going ta be shooting anyone." That was to the humans as much as to Scorponok. And, Primusdamnit, he'd sounded like fragging Prime, of all 'bots, the diplomatic fragger. "Prime'd rip out my targeting sensors if we started shooting each other," he tacked on hoping they wouldn't notice the moment of diplomacy. Ironhide was a warrior-built. He wasn't supposed to have diplomatic programming.

The static-y laugh from the drone made Ironhide think the drone hadn't been fooled. But his back legs were no longer buried in the dirt and that inexplicably made Ironhide feel a bit better.

As the laughter quieted, the bug crept a bit closer to the Topkick. Ironhide huffed again. "Whatever you came here to do or say, hurry it up. I was trying ta recharge." A lie, but Scorponok didn't know that.

In a flash the bug was clambering all over him, committing a more than a mild invasion of personal space and putting scratches in his paint. To the Pit with not transforming to make the humans comfortable.

"Holy fucking Hell!"

As soon as he had the hand to do it with, he grabbed the bug and dropped him before the fragger could even think about biting him. Scorponok laughed and burrowed where he'd been dropped, his sensor blip retreating.

Ironhide contemplated a long visible scratch on his leg armor and growled a bit. Hopefully Will had some scratch filler. Ratchet was not in a mood he'd be willing to brave for a mere repaint. Still growling his systems, he transformed and drove off to look for his friend, leaving behind a small group of completely shell shocked humans.

So that's how it was going to be. He'd live with that.

  
fini


End file.
